6 Badass Jobs That You're Probably Already Qualified to Do

#3. Hazmat Worker

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The Badass Job:

Hazmat workers, also known as decontamination specialists, are in the business of handling and disposing of the world's most dangerous substances. You've seen them in virtually every science fiction thriller that has ever been produced. They're usually in the background, picking up debris at an alien crash site, mopping up zombie guts or scrubbing the radiation off of Indiana Jones' penis.

The Staff of Ra seems a little sm -- Spear of destiny? More like -- dick jokes -- GAHHRRHHG.

They get called in when something in the environment is so dangerous it simply can't be dealt with by Will Smith alone. The hazmat crew then physically removes said danger and decontaminates the area, both to contain the damage that has already been done and to keep any additional bystanders from getting melted. It doesn't matter whether the hazardous substance in question is a sheet of asbestos, a deadly chemical spill or the Cloverfield monster ...

... they're the ones who have to deal with it. And they get to wear those badass suits in the process.

There are other requirements, too, but they're not exactly impossible to meet. Some of the listed skills are the ability to follow orders, the ability to deal with loud noises and bad smells and the ability to speak English.

That doesn't exactly sound like the elite level we were expecting from the guys who drag Lizzy Caplan away to explode behind a curtain in Cloverfield. It reads more like a Craigslist ad for a position at McDonald's -- although, at 40k a year, the pay is significantly better and medical benefits are included, if only to make sure there are no gremlins mutating in your cranium as you leave work for the day.

Getty"I bet a master's in biology would better prepare me for this experience."

#2. Ice Road Trucker

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The Badass Job:

Ice roads are exactly what they sound like -- temporary roads made on the ice covering bodies of water, when the temperature is thought to be low enough to start the sensible practice of driving trucks across them.

The good news is, it's not quite as insane as it sounds -- they're only made in places where it gets so cold that the ice can easily carry cars, and the plowing process necessary to make the road further thickens and hardens the ice. The bad news is there's still water underneath the road, and as such your vehicle can be ruined beyond repair by the simplest pressure ridge or other hiccup in fluid dynamics that may be coming your way. There are places, such as the northwestern mining areas of Canada, which can only be reached by ice roads, requiring massive amounts of supplies and quarry that have to be hauled back and forth across the frozen water. With trucks. That people drive.

Said people are called ice road truckers, and theirs is arguably one of the most harrowing jobs in existence. In addition to the constant risk of sinking if they drive even one mile per hour too fast, they must be wary of the weather conditions, because it's a son of a bitch trying to drive a loaded semi that is struggling to keep its traction on the ice with a wild Arctic storm rampaging around you like an angry Inuit spirit.

One would think only the most seasoned, carefully skilled truck drivers could even attempt to do something like that.

See, while it is absolutely a very dangerous profession, the supplies that these remote places require have to get there no matter what. This means that the trucking companies are constantly on the lookout for new drivers, and are in fact so desperate that they will literally hire anyone.

Not only do you not need to have a rig of your own, you don't even need to be a licensed truck driver. They will train you for free and set you up with a truck. Hell, they'll even pay your travel expenses. All they ask for in return is that you drive a multi-ton truck across endless fields of unfeeling, remorseless ice.

WikipediaReally, any pants-wetting ice sheet collapse would be a welcome distraction to the tedium.

#1. Bodyguard

The Badass Job:

Any job that puts someone else's life in your hands requires both serious commitment and laser-like focus. Apart from medical professionals, nowhere is this as true as with bodyguards.

Countless explosion-tastic movies have been made about bodyguards, and for good reason: The "saving the client's life" part of their jobs (which, incidentally, is every single part of their jobs) is done by looking badass, vigilantly scanning every situation for potential threats, fighting for the client's safety when necessary and, if all else fails, taking a bullet for them.

Some life-saving decisions are easier than others.

A bodyguard gets no doughnut breaks. He or she is an ever-present entity who needs to be perpetually alert, ready to spring into action at a moment's notice to defend the client by any means necessary, be it fighting off a band of ninjas with a broken table leg or shielding the client's escape with his or her own body. It stands to reason that you'd need to be halfway to the goddamn Batman before you could even think of offering your services as a bodyguard. Right?

GettyHired!

But in Reality ...

Well, you do need special certification to become a bodyguard. However, getting said certification takes about a couple of weeks.

All it takes to become a certified, professional, only-you-stand-between-your-client-and-certain-death bodyguard is a few weeks of lectures. Admittedly, these seem like totally awesome lectures, with course names like "Anti Ambush Driving (two days)" and "Firearms (two days)." We actually want to sign up for those two, just because.

GettyThey even have an "Interpersonal Skills" lesson, because clearly that's a well-used skill.

One school raises the stakes by condensing the training to a mere 28 days and flat-out states on its site that you don't need any previous security training. They even go so far as to specifically instruct potential students to quit their burger-flipping jobs to enroll and become a fully qualified bodyguard, which suggests either that the two fields are somehow related or that the talent pool the bodyguard industry is drawing from isn't quite as discriminating as we'd imagined.